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Wednesday, May 17, 2017

DearREADERS,
One of my cousins, David Taylor, sent me the following new info about his Family Nexus App. That's the one that gets Ol' Myrt's Apple Watch buzzing when I drive down I-15 past places where our ancestors are buried. I think you are going to *love* this app.

The
Family Nexus iPhone App has been downloaded more than 1500 times since
our launch in February! Thanks for your interest and support! Please
forward this newsletter or share on social media so even more people can
learn about the hottest new app in genealogy (that’s us, by the way)!

This Product Update Newsletter contains some juicy tidbits about what
we have been up to and what is coming up next. Read on to learn more and
to see what features will be released in the App Store by June 1st!

Our Mission

Our
mission is to make learning about your family history an epic adventure
of discovery! Our app is different because we don’t have primary
sources to help you research and document the lives of your ancestors.
There are many excellent companies that provide these services.

So what makes us different? We believe that family history can be more
mobile and more social! Visualizing your family tree on a map helps
identify data problems and provides new insights that don’t appear in
text alone. Our technology is exciting new people to learn about their
family history. Alerts on your phone nudge you to spend 5-10 minutes a
day learning about your ancestors. What’s more there is a magic and a
power about visiting the places where our ancestors lived and died. The
Family Nexus mobile app can do all this and more!

New Features in Beta

The
Family Nexus team has been working very hard to bring you some very
exciting features! It has only been 3 months since our last App Store
release, but every day I have been wishing we could release the new
features under development!

We have made some general
improvements and enhancements to our core, free product. We have also
been developing the Premium Features that I know you will fall in love
with. When my developers showed me the latest progress 2 weeks ago, I
literally got tingles! I hope you like them too.

Premium Subscription

A
note about our revenue model seems appropriate here. We wish we could
provide all this functionality free of charge to all our users. However,
software development is expensive and so we need a way to pay for the
development. The Family Nexus will always offer its core functionality
for free. Specifically, the ability to automatically map your
FamilySearch Family Tree data and get alerts. We will also offer
additional features exclusively to users who pay for a Premium
Subscription.

Users will have the option of choosing a 1-month,
3-month, 6-month, or 12-month Premium Subscription. Subscribers will
have access to all existing and future Premium Subscription
content. Features marked with a ($) in the article will be exclusively
for our Premium Subscription members.

Completed Items

I
know you are dying to know what is coming. So without further ado, here
is a list of new features that are currently in beta and are expected
to be in the App Store by June 1st:

Faster
download times! We have made improvements to the download manager to
reduce download time and better manage system resources.

Improvements
to Notifications! Notifications are way cool, but let’s be honest, they
can be really annoying when you get 36 all at once! Now the app groups
notifications together based on place or date.

Cleaner interface! We made several changes to the interface that make it more attractive and easier to use.

Improved Searching! Searching for an ancestor is now easier and will even find people with middle names you didn’t enter.

Invite
Facebook friends! When we find something cool we want to share it! Now
we have made it easier to invite your Facebook friends to download The
Family Nexus app!

Premium
Subscription purchase ($) – for the first time you can subscribe to
access cool features that will help you make even more discoveries about
your family history!

Filter Controls: Multiple options for filtering the event pins that appear on the map. ($)

Quick
Map Filters: From a Person Details View go to map and view only
Ancestors of that person or only Immediate Family members of that
person. ($)

Map Layer Data (cemeteries, churches, etc.). ($)

More data! Subscribers can download additional generations of ancestors, including first cousins! ($)

Family Group Display! See your ancestors in the context of their family both as a parent and a child. ($)

Memories
Display! Now you can browse photos, stories, and more all inside the
app to discover even more about your ancestors. ($)

Kickstarter Project

We
have been very grateful for the enthusiasm of our early users. Our team
appreciates ALL feedback - both "good" and "bad" - that we receive. We
have made note of feature requests, product enhancements, and other
suggestions and added those to our development road map.

We are
as eager as you are to see some of these cool ideas come to the life
and we are super excited to announce that we will launch a Kickstarter
campaign this summer to fund the development of some awesome features!
The campaign should get underway in July.

Check out the features we will develop when our project gets funded.

Social Networking Features (FREE!)

Check-in Feature: Record when you visit an ancestral location

News Feed: See when others check-in or share on social media about a common ancestor

AccuPin
(see below) news item: When someone adds AccuPin data for a common
ancestor you'll have the option of adding that data to your own device

Friends: Add "Friends" for Internal Chat or News Feed

Internal Chat: Collaborate with friends and share your excitement about discoveries using the Internal Chat feature

GPS Data ($)

"AccuPin"
feature: move the event pin to an actual address or geographic
coordinates where an event took place (instead of just the city, town,
county, etc.)

Android Version

Many
fans are Android users and we want to facilitate their discovery
moments as well. We will only be able to develop the Android version
with your support! The plan is to complete the development of the
Kickstarter features for iOS before we start development on Android.

The Android version will have "free" and "premium" features just like
the Apple version. So what can you do to help? As we get closer to the
Kickstarter campaign please share with all your friends so we can make
this dream a reality!

Conclusion

Thanks
for taking the time to read this development update. We love family
history. We love the thrill of making connections with family members
living and dead. This often happens when learning about the details of
their lives: stories, photos, and places add to the rich tapestry that
makes up your family heritage. The Family Nexus is on a mission to make
family history more social and mobile. In the process we aim to
facilitate Discovery in new and exciting ways.

We can't do this
without you. The response has been overwhelmingly positive. We believe
our app is like none other in the industry. We ask for your continued
support as we introduce new features to our Premium Subscribers and as
we launch the Kickstarter campaign. Spread the word with family and
friends! Also, tell us what kinds of features you would like to see. You
can send an email to feedback@thefamilynexus.com.

Hangouts: Pay what you want. So it's simple. If you value the work Ol' Myrt,+Cousin Russandour beloved panelists do week in and week out on your behalf, please:
Check the DearMYRTLE Hangouts Calendar for upcoming study groups and hangouts. There you'll find links to the GeneaConference (in-person) and the GeneaWebinars Calendar with over over 200 hours of online genealogy classes, webinars, live streams and
tweetchats from other hosts and presenters over the next 12 months.